The mental market
Published: Sat, Mar. 01, 2008 12:30AM
Modified Sat, Mar. 01, 2008 03:01AM
E-Mail
Print
tool name
closeYour series "Mental Disorder" has provided excellent coverage of complex issues. However, some key points about community support services need to be illuminated.
Community support merged two services with different reimbursement rates and credential requirements from the old system. With the new service, worker credentials were reduced to the lowest common denominator. Reimbursement rates are the same if the service is provided by an experienced master's level clinician or by someone who just graduated from a GED program.
CS is meant to provide not only skill-building in activities of daily living, but also more clinically sophisticated services such as counseling, managing symptoms, monitoring for possible medication side effects and helping patients deal with other chronic health conditions.
More Letters
Designers opened the new system to market forces. It should come as no surprise then that 98 percent of this important service is being provided by high school graduates.
The Division of Mental Health, Substance Abuse and Developmental Disabilities has dragged its feet when pressed to correct this problem by lamenting that if given the opportunity, federal administrators might want to completely change things. Maybe change is not such a bad idea.
Beth McElhinney
Board director, Mental Health Association in Orange County
Durham
Get it all with convenient home delivery of The News & Observer.
The News & Observer is pleased to be able to offer its users the opportunity to make comments and hold conversations online. However, the interactive nature of the internet makes it impracticable for our staff to monitor each and every posting.
Since The News & Observer does not control user submitted statements, we cannot promise that readers will not occasionally find offensive or inaccurate comments posted on our website. In addition, we remind anyone interested in making an online comment that responsibility for statements posted lies with the person submitting the comment, not The News and Observer.
If you find a comment offensive, clicking on the exclamation icon will flag the comment for review by the administrators, we are counting on the good judgment of all our readers to help us.
